


the cat's meow

by orphan_account



Category: Persona 4
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Urban Fantasy, F/F, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-04
Updated: 2016-06-04
Packaged: 2018-07-12 04:27:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,409
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7085653
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Yosuke gets a cat. Hijinks ensue.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the cat's meow

"Okay, okay, I'm home!" Yosuke yelled, dropping his shopping bags to the floor and massaging his sore fingers. "Jeez, you're needy."

His cat looked up from kneading at his feet, staring at him with big, beseeching eyes. Yosuke frowned. He tried to keep frowning, but he couldn't stay mad at a cat for long. Especially not a cat crawling up his chest and trying to bury itself in his shoulder.

 _His_ cat. No, that was wrong. The cat wasn't really his, Yosuke corrected himself. No way. This cat was a Russian Blue--according to Google searches for 'wat kind of cat is big n gray' and some guesswork--and had looked remarkably well-fed and healthy when Yosuke found him, despite being soaked to the skin, circling his feet and mewing pathetically in the rain.

No, this was someone's baby. Probably belonged to some crazy old cat lady with a mansion full of purebred Persians. One of these days, someone would respond to the ads he'd posted online and take the cat off his hands. Until then, well...

He'd always kind of wanted to have a pet.

"I don't know how I'm gonna eat this month," Yosuke told the cat, absently stroking his short gray fur. "But I got you everything. Food, toys, litter box, scratching post... man, I hope your owner really is a rich old lady. I'm gonna write her an invoice for all this crap."

"Mreeow," the cat told him, putting a paw on his face.

"Dumbass," Yosuke snorted, but scratched him behind the ears anyway.

-

"I didn't know you had a cat, Yosuke-kun."

Yosuke nearly dropped the mugs of instant coffee he was carrying.

The cat was sitting in Yukiko's lap. _Purring._

The bastard. It'd never purred for him.

"Isn't he cute, Chie? I want a cat, too."

"Our apartment doesn't let us have pets, you know that." Chie reminded her softly, but leaned over to stroke its chin. "He really is cute, though! What's his name, Yosuke?"

"Um. He doesn't." Yosuke settled the coffee mugs on the table cautiously, sweeping aside a heap of bills and CDs and making Chie frown in disgust. "Have a name, I mean. I found him when I was walking home from work a couple days ago. I thought he might be someone else's cat. I didn't wanna rename him, he might get confused or something."

"Well, you can't just call him 'cat'," Chie said, and ignored Yosuke when he opened his mouth to point out that actually, yes, he very well could, and had in fact been doing so for the last few days. "He kinda reminds me of this boy I used to go to school with. What was his name? Sosuke... no, Souji! He looks like a Souji, don't you think?"

"He doesn't look like an anything," Yosuke said doubtfully.

"I think that's a wonderful name." Yukiko ran her fingers over the cat's belly. He was lying on his back and purring like a motorcycle engine. Yosuke knew a lot of guys who would kill to lay on Yukiko's thighs like that. "Souji-kun. Do you like that name, Souji-kun?"

The newly christened Souji meowed appreciatively.

-

"What were you doing getting all cosy with her for, huh?" Yosuke mock-scolded him, later, when they'd finally left his house and safely dropped off their housewarming gift (a blender. He hadn't had the heart to tell them he already had a blender, in the same colour and make as the one they'd given him. Maybe he'd pawn it off on Kanji for Christmas or something.). Souji batted at his thigh, clearly begging for the convenience-store bento that was Yosuke's dinner. "No. No! Bad boy! Down! Down!"

Souji was smart, at least. He dropped to the floor immediately, curling up and shrinking in on himself. "Mew?" he tried, giving Yosuke's foot an experimental bat.

"Dude, I just filled your bowl." Yosuke reluctantly tore himself off his sofa and walked to where he'd left Souji's food and water. "You didn't even touch it! I got you the freakin' gourmet stuff, you should be all over it."

"Mrow," Souji told him.

"What, does it taste bad, or something?"

Yosuke set his bento on the floor, eyeing the bowl of brown pellets suspiciously. He supposed it didn't _look_ very appetizing. "Come on. It can't be that bad."

Souji glared at him suspiciously.

"It probably tastes great, trust me. See?"

There are moments in life when your mouth works faster than your brain does, and you end up saying things you don't really mean. Or, moments in life, as Yosuke was about to discover, where your hands start moving of their own accord, and it takes your brain a second to kick in and realize what's going on.

Yosuke scooped a few pellets into his mouth and bit down.

Souji stared.

It took a few minutes before Yosuke managed to stop retching and coughing. He perched on the sofa, anxiously sipping at a glass of water, trying to get the aftertaste out of his mouth, only half paying attention to the variety show playing on TV.

Souji ate every bite of what remained of Yosuke's bento.

-

"Meow."

"What?"

"Mreeow."

"What? Do you need to pee? I'll get your litterbox, gimme a sec."

"Mre-ow! Meow!"

"Wha--stop trying to eat the remote. What? You want me to change the channel?"

"Mrow."

"This is stupid."

Tap.

Tap-tap-tap-tap-tap.

"Mrrr."

"This is the weather channel, you weirdo. C'mon, gimme five minutes, lemme finish my show."

"Mrow!"

-

Yosuke had a job at a local supermarket as an all-round, shelf-stocking, customer-wheeling-and-dealing, mess-cleaning, item-labelling general worker. It wasn't the best job in the world, but it paid the bills, so that had to count for something. His weekends were mostly spent watching TV, sleeping, reading manga, and being dragged out by friends, as well as spending a lot of time--well, he was a healthy young twenty-something whose last romantic experience had ended disastrously in high school, so--

"No, nooo, leave me alone." Yosuke yanked his hand out of his pants and used it to brace himself against the flimsy bathroom door. The lock had broken a few months ago and he'd never gotten around to fixing it. "No, I don't care if you're bored. Go away."

Souji scratched at the door, giving him a frustrated 'mrr', before giving up and padding away. Yosuke waited five minutes before allowing himself to breathe.

He was ready to continue.

His dick, however, wasn't.

Yosuke pressed his head against the cool tiles of the bathroom wall and groaned.

-

"Don't give me that look. I told you, I'm giving you the cold shoulder." Yosuke kept his eyes very firmly fixed on the TV. He'd even pulled his headphones on for maximum effect. Souji tried to crawl into his lap, but he shook him off immediately, scooting to the other side of the sofa. "Oh no. You know what you did."

"Meow?" Souji inquired, padding towards him. Yosuke pulled his feet up to his chest and glared.

"You monster." He yanked his headphones off, waggling them in the cat's face. "You chewed on the wires! My wires! And you knocked over my lamp when I caught you! Do you know how much that _cost_?"

Souji deflated. He rubbed his body against Yosuke's thigh instead, meowing plaintively.

Yosuke narrowed his eyes. "That's not gonna work." He leaned over, just barely managing to grab his cup of instant ramen from the table, fiercely stabbing the limp noodles with a plastic fork. "I'm never going to forgive you. Ever."

Souji decided to disappear under the sofa in shame.

On screen, the TV promised a steamy sex scene after the commercial break. Yosuke's stance slackened. He let his feet spill off the sofa and onto the floor, one after the other. He sat through a weird TV spot for soy milk, a badly animated fast food commercial, and a missing persons notice, half zoning out, when all of a sudden--

"MREEEEOW!"

Yosuke dropped his cup of ramen.

A change of pants and a sore lap later, he had to explain to a couple of well-meaning neighbours that, no, he was totally fine, mostly, and he was very, very sorry for all the screaming, and that they didn't need to call the cops.

-

"Hey, Naoto?"

" _She ain't here at the moment, Senpai_."

"I--wait, Kanji, why do you have Naoto's phone? Hey, don't tell me... did you guys finally do it?"

" _Wha--_ " Yosuke had to hold the phone a few inches away from his ear, lest he be deafened by Kanji's indignant yelling. " _Senpai! She's kinda busy at the moment, I keep telling you, she's not--I'm not--no, nothing, it's Yosuke-senpai, he's being an ass--_ "

"Just put her on the line, Kanji."

There was a lot of enthusiastic barking in the background.

" _Shirogane Shelter, how may I help you?_ "

"Oh, hey, Naoto, how's everything going?" He tried to keep a jaunty smile in his voice, though it was hard to talk and keep an eye on Souji at the same time. His cat was batting at a toy he'd left out, a bunch of feathers and bells tied to a stick, both of them coming dangerously close to his chair. He shoved Souji's butt with his toe. Souji smacked his foot in exchange. "Uh-huh. Yeah. Okay. Hey, listen, is there any way you could squeeze a cat in at your place?"

Souji went very still.

Yosuke nudged the toy with his other foot, hoping the merry jingling would distract him. It worked. "Uh--didn't Yukiko tell you? I picked up this cat the other day, and I'm pretty busy, so... What? Uh, male. I think. He's pretty big. I don't know how old he is. How can you tell how old a cat is? Anyway, I could really use the favour..."

" _We're a bit overstuffed with dogs at the moment, unfortunately_." Naoto sounded genuinely sorry, but still composed. Kanji, meanwhile, sounded like he was being murdered. There was more happy barking and yipping. " _You know how it is, Senpai. Parents buy their children puppies for Christmas, and by New Year's they regret having to take on the task of looking after an animal. And Valentines' Day is coming soon, so by April we'll probably be expecting more puppies--_ "

"Please don't remind me about Valentines' Day, Nao-chan." Yosuke groaned. "Right. Got it. Can I at least take him in for a checkup or something? Don't want him breathing diseases all over me--hey, hey, hey, what gives?"

Souji was pulling at the leg of his trousers. With his teeth.

"H-hey, stop, hey--yeah, talk to you later, Naoto, tell Kanji he needs to man up--Souji! These took me two months to save up for!" He hung up, fingers fumbling, struggling to shove his phone into his pocket. He picked the cat up with both hands, stroking the soft shell of his ears. "Well, looks like it's gonna be just me and you, buddy. No cushy shelter food, no handmade toys, no huge garden for you to run around in..."

Souji closed his eyes. He wriggled out of Yosuke's grasp, but stayed in his lap, milling about for a few seconds before sitting down and curling against his stomach. Yosuke held his breath. The gray cat was small and solid and warm.

"Well," Yosuke said, stroking the entire length of Souji's body. "I guess my place isn't that bad, either."

-

The rain came crashing down without any warning. Yosuke laid in bed, scrolling through his phone in the darkness, hugging a spare pillow to his chest as he tried to burrow deeper into his blanket. The headline took up a huge chunk of the page: _Top 9 Spooky Urban Legends--What Happens In #7 Will Keep You Out Of Love Hotels Forever!_

It was probably a bad idea to read an article like this in the middle of a dark and stormy night.

He clicked _Read More_.

His eyes roved over lurid descriptions of dead bodies under beds and car crashes in mysterious forests and all manner of haunted spirits and vengeful ghosts--and suddenly something fuzzy tried to force its way under his blanket.

"What the fuck!" Yosuke shrieked. Souji stared back at him innocently. "Dude! Stop sneaking up on me like that! I could've died from a heart attack!"

Souji meowed. Thunder and lightning crashed outside, lighting up the room like a strobe. The cat's small ears were laid flat against the top of his head.

Yosuke's expression softened, despite himself. "Hey, you're cold, huh?" He held out his hand, letting Souji rub up against it, all warm fur and delicate bones. He squeezed lightly, rubbing along the cat's spine. "Okay, you can stay. Just don't pee on my bed or do anything gross."

He thought he heard Souji purr as he finally drifted off to sleep. He turned over and smiled into his pillow.

-

"You're about 2000 yen short, dear--oh. Oh, my."

Yosuke paled. Souji had somehow emerged from his bedroom to come curling around his feet, staring up at Yosuke's landlady, despite all of his efforts to teach Souji to stay. Hisano's expression changed. She looked--angry? Shocked? Surprised? He couldn't tell.

"H-he's not mine!" Yosuke scrambled to explain. "I just--I found him in the street, and I couldn't--it's just temporary. Until his owner comes to get him." Did she ever mention anything about pets? He hadn't really read the contract all the way through. Maybe he could call Naoto again and beg her to come pick Souji up--

"What a darling." Hisano knelt down on rickety knees, holding out her hand for the cat to sniff. "I used to have cats, myself."

"Oh? Y-yeah." He forced his mouth into a smile. "Yeah, uh, it's been kinda tough, but I think we're really getting along now, you know?"

"Cats are temperamental creatures." Hisano agreed. "But wonderful companions, if you take the time to understand them."

"That sounds about right."

Hisano gave Souji one final scritch under his chin, then brushed off her dress as she got back up. "Well, I'd best be off, now. Take care, dear."

"Yeah," Yosuke grinned. "You too. Have a nice day, Mrs H."

He shut the door behind him. Yosuke gathered the gray cat up in his hands and nuzzled him under his chin.

"Do you know what you just did?" He beamed, smiling into the cat's half-moon eyes. "You're a walking discount on rent, that's what you are. You freakin' lifesaver."

Souji just meowed back.

-

"Everything appears to be in order."

They made an odd pair, Naoto in her doctor's whites and Kanji in a hand-sewn apron with a big paw print on the front. Their shelter was open to most household animals, but mostly dogs; when he'd gotten there Yosuke had to step carefully around a minefield of yapping puppies, holding Souji's cat carrier over his head.

"Yeah, where'd you get him?" Kanji tickled the side of Souji's face, careful to avoid his whiskers. "Don't think anyone'd kick out a purebred Russian Blue. Not when you could sell him. Probably belonged to a breeder."

"How'd you know that?"

"He's still got--he ain't been--" Kanji made a scissor-blade motion with his hands, and Yosuke paled. "Yeah. That. But you should think about keepin' him for real. Any good breeder'd have come looking by now."

"Do you want to have him neutered, then?" Naoto took Souji from her colleague, prying his mouth open with gloved fingers. "He's old enough, and in good enough health for the procedure."

Souji's pupils shrunk to slits.

"I dunno," Yosuke said. "That stuff's a man's pride, y'know?"

"Ain't very manly if he goes 'round fathering a buncha kittens you don't want." Kanji pointed out. "And he'll start screamin' if he sees a female in heat. You don't want that, trust me."

"He'll be fine, there aren't any other cats in the area. I think."

Naoto glanced at him doubtfully.

"I'll think about it. I've got your number if I feel like scheduling an appointment." He glanced at the calendar on the wall, each tiny square filled with Naoto's neat, compact handwriting, with one or two messy scrawls and little drawings from Kanji. The square for February 14th was conspicuously empty. "Sooo... you guys have plans for V-day, huh?"

"Yeah," Kanji grunted. "I'm taking all the dogs out to the beach. We're closed early on that day, 'cuz Naoto's busy."

" _Naoto's_ busy? Without you?"

Naoto flushed under her hat, suddenly very interested in cleaning her medical instruments.

"Rise just got off her tour," Kanji pointed out. "Bullied her manager into keeping Valentines' Day free and everyth'--what? He's gonna find out sooner or later."

"My personal life is neither your or Yosuke-senpai's business," she muttered. "W-well. If you'll excuse me, I think Teddie needs another shot of his medication."

"What about you, Senpai?" Kanji asked, gently coaxing Souji back into his cat carrier and shutting the door. "You seein' anyone?"

Yosuke ran a hand through his hair. He sighed dramatically. "Kanji, if you need a hand with those dogs on Valentines' Day... I might be free to help."

-

Yosuke woke in the middle of the night, jolted awake from a nightmare, only to come eye-to-eye with Souji.

Who was in the middle of licking his crotch.

Yosuke stared. And stared.

"Could you _please_ do that somewhere else?"

-

"Nao-chan told me you have a cat!" Rise exclaimed, pushing her pink shades on top of her head. "C'mon, you said you wanted to leave early so you could go check on him, right? I love cats! I wanna see him!"

Yosuke didn't know how he'd ended up befriending an idol. Or, rather, he'd had no idea the shy, mousy teenager he'd befriended in middle school would turn out to be an idol. He didn't complain, though; a signed poster or mug from Risette went a long way when measured in rent-money terms.

"Won't the paparazzi freak about you going to some strange guy's house?" He could swear some people had given her double takes in the street.

"Nope." Rise shook her head, beaming. "Kanami gave me some really good tips about going stealth. Like, nobody could tell who I was when I went in one day without my usual makeup. Not even my own manager! Can you believe it? Isn't this a great disguise?"

Yosuke gave her a good, long look.

"Nah," he said at last. "You look the same to me."

Rise pouted.

They chatted about her career and Kanamin Kitchen's latest album during the walk back to his apartment. Yosuke half-heartedly tried to prod about her relationship with Naoto, because he knew they'd sort of been friends in high school, but now they'd both grown up, and he had no idea how an idol and a vet could find anything in common, let alone find enough to build a relationship on. Rise shook her head and mimed zipping up her lips. "Can't risk all that juicy gossip leaking out, senpai!"

"What juicy gossip?" he'd gaped, but Rise took the conversation by the wheel and steered it back to complaining about filming for her guest appearance in some up-and-coming starlet's music video.

They came up to Yosuke's door. He flung it wide open. "Hey, Souji, I'm home!"

"Your cat's name is Souji?"

"Yeah, uh--long story." Yosuke took a few tentative steps into his apartment. "Souji? Where are you, boy?"

Rise helped him look. They crouched under furniture and checked under bedcovers and under the kitchen sink. They went through the apartment over and over, until it was time for Rise to leave. She left a full bowl of food and water on the doorstep. In case he came back hungry, she said.

"You should leave a shirt or something out, too. Nao-chan told me that. So he can catch a smell of home." She caught his expression, and tried to smile. "I'm sure he'll come back! My grandma's cats used to wander around outside all the time, but they always showed up for dinner."

"Yeah." He couldn't explain why that explanation made his heart sink. "Yeah, you're right."

-

"Hello?"

" _Yosuke-kun?_ " It was Chie. Yosuke balanced his phone between his ear and his shoulder as he worked, signing off something on a clipboard and handing it to the nearest intern. " _I'm so sorry about Souji. Yukiko's really upset. She really wanted to come play with him again._ "

"You're making it sound like he's dead."

" _Oh, shoot. Well--Yukiko said she wanted to help you make posters? Do you have any pictures of him we could use?_ "

Pictures. He dragged a hand down his face. "No. Never thought about taking any." Shit. Why hadn't he? Wasn't that the first thing most pet owners would have done?

" _That's okay. We'll figure something out._ "

"Yeah, thanks. I'll--guess I'll talk to you later."

 _He's just a fucking cat_ , Yosuke told himself, in between stacking boxes of cereal onto the shelves. _Maybe he finally found his owner. His real owner. He wasn't even your cat to begin with, goddammit._

_He wasn't ever your cat to begin with--_

"Hana-chan?"

Yosuke nearly jumped out of his skin. His manager took a few steps back in surprise. "S-saki-san! Hey! Don't worry, I'm almost done here--"

Saki eyed him carefully. "You look upset."

"It's nothing," he started, but the rest of his sentence forced its way out of him. "My cat's been missing for three days."

"Oh, I'm so sorry to hear that." And she sounded sorry, too. "Perhaps--perhaps you should take a break?"

"I'll be fine--" He turned to where she was looking. All the boxes of cereal were arranged backwards, rows of nutritional information facing back at him instead of mascots and brand names. "--Okay. Give me five minutes."

"Make it ten," Saki sighed, and brushed him aside to rearrange the shelves herself.

-

" _Senpai? You there? H-hey, remember when you said you could give me a hand with the dogs? Well, uh, can I cash in on that favour right now, 'cause--_ "

"Not now, Kanji." Yosuke rolled over onto his stomach, turning away from the TV screen. A soppy young couple was kissing. The Valentines' day block on TV promised more soppy couples coming up. What a joke. Alone on Valentines' day, without even his cat to keep him company. "It's been a week. He's been gone for a week."

" _He's a cat, that's what they do. Now, dogs, on the other han--Teddie! Teddie, give me back my shoe, fuck--_ "

"What if he's been run over or something, Kanji?" He knew he sounded ridiculous, but he couldn't make himself stop. "And it's all my fault, 'cause I work all day and I don't pay him enough attention and I yell at him all the time and--"

" _Senpai..._ "

"Or maybe someone else's taken him in, and they're way better owners to him than I'll ever be, and he's never gonna come back--"

" _Goddammit, Senpai._ " One of Kanji's dogs howled, the sound eerie in the darkness of Yosuke's living room. " _Listen. We get tons of strays. Tons. People get rid of their pets all the time. Doesn't matter if they're pedigrees or mutts. Soon as people get tired of 'em, they just kick 'em out, and they either go feral or they die 'cause they can't get used to being strays. And if they're too far gone, me and Naoto, we hate doing it, but we got no choice but to call animal control on 'em._ "

Yosuke quietly dabbed at his eyes with his shirt.

" _So. Anyone who takes in a stray, anyone who's willin' to fuckin' love an animal someone else kicked out--that's good in my book. You did the best you could, Senpai, and don't let anyone tell you anythin' else._ " His voice softened. " _You should come down to the beach. Maybe hanging out with the dogs'll be good for y--_ "

"Souji?"

" _Huh?_ "

"Souji! He came back!"

" _You smokin' or someth--_ "

Yosuke hung up.

Souji was silver in the moonlight. The cat balanced itself precariously on a branch just outside his window, taking small, measured paces towards home.

His mouth felt like it was about to run dry watching this insane tightrope act. "Come on. Come on, boy. You can do it--" And suddenly there was the thick smell of cat in his nose and fur all over his face and Souji anxiously licking him.

Yosuke clutched his cat to his chest and couldn't stop crying. "You--you--fucking--where have you _been_? God, c'mere, you stupid cat, I love you."

Somewhere, a clock rang out for midnight.

"I'm sorry," Souji said.

-

It had taken half an hour for Yosuke to calm down. It made sense, Yu supposed. He'd had to deal with losing a cat and suddenly gaining him again--only to deal with his cat turning out to not actually be a cat after all.

"Souji?"

"My name's Yu, actually. Narukami Yu." He smiled. He was silver-haired and pale and the flickering light from the streets outside made him look almost luminous. "But you can keep calling me Souji. I don't mind."

"This is--am I dreaming?" Yosuke seized his arm with two fingers and twisted. "Ow. Okay, I'm not dreaming, so I guess I must've gone fucking mad with grief..."

"This isn't a dream." Yu said calmly. "Though I guess it does sound kind of stupid. See, I kind of broke up with this girl, and I always thought she was kinda weird 'cause she'd joke about being into occult stuff all the time, but--turns out, it wasn't a joke after all."

"It's like a fairy tale." Yosuke said, looking somewhat dazed. "Like, uh, Beauty and the Beast. You get cursed into being an animal for a bajillion years until someone breaks it with the power of true lo--"

He stopped. A horrified look crept onto his face.

"Right. She did like that kind of stuff, come to think of it. She used to collect classic children's books all the time... it wasn't a bajillion years, though. More like, uh, two months before I met you, I think." Yu shrugged. His shoulders rippled. Yosuke was very pointedly not staring. "And you managed to break the curse, so I guess that means...?"

"I was in love with my _cat?_ " Yosuke squeaked.

"Well, 'true love' is kinda vague. If a little girl really loved me, I think she would've been able to break the spell, too."

"But you didn't pick a little girl."

Yu winced. "I used to volunteer at a daycare center. Kids aren't exactly the kind of people you wanna trust with breaking weird curses. And, well, uh... I kinda followed you around for a couple days before picking you." For the first time since he'd turned human, Yu's steely exterior cracked just a little. "I mean, I was a cat, but I still had--y'know--human thoughts. Desires."

" _You licked your junk in front of me._ "

"Towards the end, I guess my mind was... changing. I kept having these weird thoughts, like my mind was getting taken over by all the cat instincts. So I had to run away. I had to make sure I could get you to break the curse soon. I'm still sorry about that, by the way. I know you've been really worried about me." Yu glanced at him, and nudged his arm softly. "Yosuke? You okay?"

Yosuke sat up. He sniffed, giving his eyes a final, tired rub.

"Yu?"

"Yeah?"

"Go put some pants on."

-

"So it wasn't actually Souji," Rise said. "You just heard a noise at the door and _thought_ it was Souji, but it was really just your friend from out of town."

"Yeah." Yosuke replied, busying himself with stirring his cup of coffee. "That's exactly what happened."

"It's strange." Yukiko chimed in. "He kind of looks like Souji, don't you think?"

Yu shrugged. "Really? I'm more of a dog person, myself. I had a Great Dane when I was little. His name was Izanagi."

"Hell of a name to give a dog," said Kanji, lying on the floor, busying himself with the latest addition to the Shirogane Shelter, an extremely spirited Pomeranian named Teddie.

"I thought it was cool."

"No wonder you're friends with Yosuke." Chie laughed. "One time, our teacher tried to make us dissect live frogs for Biology, but Yosuke got attached and named his frog Jiraiya and tried to take it home in his schoolbag."

"What happened to Jiraiya?" Yukiko asked, wide-eyed.

"Died." Yosuke said flatly. "He suffocated in my bag on the way home."

"Oh dear."

"Regardless, would you like me to help you look for Souji?" Naoto offered. "We do have a sizable network of animal lovers, and it'd be fairly easy for them to spot a missing Russian Blue."

"Nah." Yosuke cast a look in Yu's direction. "I don't know why, but I have a feeling he's in a good place right now."

He'd gotten very good at ignoring things over the last few months. He excused himself to rinse out his mug, and didn't hear how Rise scooted over to give Naoto a stage whisper about how Yu was wearing _his_ clothes.

-

Yu had to be reunited with his family. He was picked up by some gruff uncle of his, and Yosuke had thought it strange that a relative would come by instead of his parents, considering how long he'd been missing, but Yu didn't find it out of the ordinary, so Yosuke kept his mouth shut. He went back to work on Monday, a little more listless than usual, but as far as his co-workers were concerned, none the worse for wear.

Still, it was strange to come home to an empty house each evening, without a cat to wind around his ankles or someone to beg for scraps from him at dinner. Yu had his number--he'd asked for it before he left--but he didn't have Yu's, and he thought it'd be weird to try contacting him again. Yu had been nothing but courteous during the few days he'd spent as a human in Yosuke's house, even offering to cook dinner ('I was kinda tired of seeing you eat all those instant meals, actually') and sleeping on the couch without complaint.

If he'd been a bit weird as a cat, he'd said that the cat hormones had been fucking him up, so that was hardly his fault. Yosuke figured that if _he'd_ been turned into a cat and done stupid shit in someone's house, he'd like to forget all about it too.

He pulled a frozen dinner out of the fridge and stuffed it in his microwave. He was about to set the timer when there was a knock on the door.

Yosuke opened it a crack, then pulled it wide open.

Yu was holding something pink and box-shaped.

"Hey," he said.

"Hey." Yosuke blinked. "What--what's up?" Not the best of lines, but his brain seemed to be wiped clean at the moment.

"I just wanted to ask." Yu shuffled his feet awkwardly. "This is--I guess this is kind of a weird thing to say, but--I actually have a place nearby."

"You want me to come over?" Yosuke leaned against the doorframe, wishing he'd thought to put better pants on. "You could've just called, y'know."

"No. Well, yes, but. Would you--would you like to come live with me?" Yu watched his expression carefully and broke into a laugh, clearly trying to diffuse the situation. Yosuke found a smile tugging at his lips. "No offence, but you've got some pretty awful living habits. I get the feeling you could use someone to keep you in check. And I thought you'd miss having a cat, so..."

The pink box meowed.

A cat carrier. A much fancier cat carrier than the cheap wire one he'd used for Yu. Souji. Whatever.

"Her name's Nanako," Yu said softly. "I thought maybe we could look after her together. If you want."

Yosuke took a deep breath. He felt like the world was spinning a little too fast for him to handle. But it was a good kind of spinning; the kind of dizzying thrill he got from rollercoasters and thrill rides. Like something big was waiting for him around the corner.

"I'd love to," he said, and his hand brushed Yu's as he reached for the cat carrier.

-

**Author's Note:**

> notes/outtakes:
> 
> \- i don't know why i made kanji and naoto vets/shelter owners but kept everyone else's jobs (it's not mentioned but chie is a junior officer and yukiko is taking hotel management in college.) i mostly thought it'd be funny to have kanji and naoto raise dogs together
> 
> \- not included because i couldn't find a way to jam it in: the curse had one final side effect. yu makes cat noises when he does the... horizontal tango... with yosuke. this is a detail shamelessly cribbed from an old Bad Bad Bathhouse fill (http://badx2bathhouse.livejournal.com/543.html?thread=1287711#t1287711), which is a great piece, and you should read it
> 
> \- not the best title. i apologize. also apologize for the overabundance of yosuke torture, but it's too much fun to mess with my boy captain ressentiment
> 
> you can find me at @gokaisaber on twitter!


End file.
